From the Librarianâ€™s Desk

the Library are busy presenting film, music, sailing, and health programs. All have been well and enthusiastically attended this winter, and there’s more to come.

The Press does a great job of covering our programs and you can always check our library home page at www.jamestownri. com/library for current news and information. Our Events Keeper calendar is a great new addition to our service, and library programs can be viewed at a glance.

Our most exciting new addition would be the Rhode Island EZone, where you are a click away from downloading Ebooks and audiobooks. We are proud to be one of seven libraries in the state participating in the program, which we hope to see expanded as more libraries join and more materials are purchased. Right now, you can borrow two titles for two weeks, and again, I refer you to our home page where you click on the Rhode Island E-Zone.

On the cart, just waiting to be claimed:

• “Absolute Beginner’s Guide to Computer Basics” third edition — no prior computer experience necessary is the promise of this book. If you need a little handholding, the library staff are always available to help you get started. Call the library at 4237280 for a half-hour, one-on-one introduction to our home page and databases, and ask for Deb or Judy. It’s good to make an appointment so that we can give you our full attention.

• Christopher Lowell’s “Seven Layers of Organization” is possibly the best looking organizing book we’ve had in here in a while. There are great tips for the square-foot challenged and that would be many of us. For the people with lots of room, you know you need to organize.

• “The Best DVDs You’ve Never Seen, Just Missed or Almost Forgotten,” recommended by the film critics of the New York Times. Now, we know you can sit at your computer and search Rotten Tomatoes or IMBD, but what can replace sitting down with a book to make a list of DVDs that you are going to watch. You can borrow titles from around Rhode Island by placing your holds on our Cooperating Libraries Automated Network.

• And speaking of DVDs, remember that the library has DVD copies of the films shown by the Friends of the Library’s in their Foreign Film Series. If you missed “Children of Heaven,” be sure to take it home soon. Nominated for an Academy Award as Best Foreign Language Film, this Iranian film is suitable for family viewing.

Books on CD to take when you travel:

• “The Experts’ Guide to 100 Things Everyone Should Know How to Do” by Samantha Ettus provides insights into doing the “small stuff” of everyday life better. It’s “100 brief how-to essays by 100 of the world’s leading experts.”

• “How to Talk so Teens will Listen & Listen so Teens will Talk” by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish. “ This all-new volume offers both innovative, easy-toimplement suggestions and proven techniques to build the foundation for lasting relationships.”

• “The Plot Against America” by Philip Roth read by Ron Silver. The world as it is after a newly elected president negotiates a cordial “understanding” with Adolf Hitler.

• “A Long Way Down” by Nick Hornby. “Four different people find themselves on the same roof on New Year’s Eve, but they have one thing in common — they’re all there to jump to their deaths,” according to the School Library Journal.

Fiction of note:

• “Gate of the Sun,” by Elias Khoury,” was first published in 1998 in Arabic by a Beirut publisher, and then translated into Hebrew and French. This book was Le Monde Diplomatique’s Book of the Year in 2002. . . . Well researched, deeply imagined, expressively written and overtly nostalgic, the book uses the lyrical flashback style of 1001 Arabian Nights to tell stories of Palestine. At a makeshift hospital in the Shatila refugee camp on the outskirts of Beirut, Dr. Khalil sits by the bed of his gravely ill, unconscious friend and patient, Yunes, a Palestinian fighter, and reminisces about their lives in an attempt to bring him back to consciousness,” according to Publisher’s Weekly.

• “Turning Thirty” by Mike Gayle: “British novelist Gayle, author of “My Legendary Girlfriend” and “Dinner for Two,” tackles the big 3-0 in his latest novel to hit stateside. Matt Beckford has a good job in New York and lives with his beautiful girlfriend, Elaine. But when Elaine breaks up with him, Matt finds himself on a new course, requesting a transfer and moving back home to Birmingham to live with his parents in the interim. Matt is none too thrilled by the prospect of turning 30 while living in his childhood home, but he finds himself revisiting his youth. Readers, especially those approaching 30, or just past it, will especially relate to the struggles of Matt and his friends to find direction and love in the face of a benchmark birthday,” Booklist said.

Well, so much for the good news. Library lovers — brace yourselves. We are about to experience another “migration,” that dreaded of all computer experiences, our second in a little over two years.

We are hopeful and optimistic. In the next six weeks, the library staff will be learning the new system called Millenium. Many of you will be familiar with the format as it is the system used by URI and HELIN. We remember and appreciate how patient and kind our public was in the last migration. We beg your indulgence and co-operation in the next. There will be more on this later, as we will be sending out frequent press releases to keep you informed.